


and i can't forget your style or your cynicism

by ladybex



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Band geeks - Freeform, Ben is grumpy, F/M, Fluff, Kinda?, Late 2000 aesthetic, Prompt Fill, Rey is a Kenobi bc reasons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-28
Updated: 2018-05-28
Packaged: 2019-05-14 16:28:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14773128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladybex/pseuds/ladybex
Summary: “You’re in my chair,” says an unfamiliar and surprisingly deep voice from above her.Out of the corner of her eye, Rey Kenobi catches a glimpse of the rattiest pair of Converse she’s ever seen, her own Chucks included, and allows her eyes to travel up from the high-tops, past the skinny jeans that look painted on and only pauses momentarily at the tight black Fall Out Boy t-shirt, because no teenage boy should have shoulders that broad.The teenage boy in question is wearing a deep scowl and oozes impatience from the way he holds tightly onto the neck of his tenor sax, his deep brown eyes barely concealing his immediate dislike of her, trying to intimidate her further.Or well, they would if he hadn’t straightened his long, black hair within an inch of it life and left it to fall into his face in a casual-yet-totally-on-purpose manner.At least his scowl was still intimidating.





	and i can't forget your style or your cynicism

**Author's Note:**

> title from "Homesick At Space Camp" by Fall Out Boy

November 2008

“You’re in my chair,” says an unfamiliar and surprisingly deep voice from above her.  
  
Out of the corner of her eye, Rey Kenobi catches a glimpse of the rattiest pair of Converse she’s ever seen, her own Chucks included, and allows her eyes to travel up from the high-tops, past the skinny jeans that look painted on and only pauses momentarily at the tight black Fall Out Boy t-shirt, because no teenage boy should have shoulders that broad.  
  
The teenage boy in question is wearing a deep scowl and oozes impatience from the way he holds tightly onto the neck of his tenor sax, his deep brown eyes barely concealing his immediate dislike of her, trying to intimidate her further.  
  
Or well, they would if he hadn’t straightened his long, black hair within an inch of it life and left it to fall into his face in a casual-yet-totally-on-purpose manner.  
  
At least his scowl was still intimidating.  
  
“Pardon?” she asks meekly, eyes flitting around the room to see if there was anyone else this boy could be talking to.  
  
“First chair is mine,” he says with an exasperated huff. He takes a moment to brush his fringe out of his face, and he would be cute if it wasn’t for the fact he looks like he’s been sucking on a lemon, lips pursed in annoyance.  
  
“Oh uh, I was told to sit here,” is all she can manage before the boy’s face flashes with anger and he suddenly starts scanning the room for someone.  
  
“Was it Hux? Ginger kid, kinda looks like a weasel? He’s a dick and he’s still butthurt about my solo during marching season, but this joke is kind of lame even for him,” the boy, who has failed to even introduce himself, says as he eyes up the instrument storage room.  
  
“No. I don’t know a Hux. I’m sorry, we haven’t met. I’m Rey Kenobi, I’m a freshman transfer, I started here in September right after the beginning of the school year,” she says as she holds out her hand by way of introduction.  
  
The tall boy eyes her hand suspiciously before taking it in an unexpectedly soft manner, giving it the lightest of shakes before letting it go and returning his hands to rest protectively over his instrument.  
  
“I know who you are, everyone does. It’s not everyday a British chick starts school in the middle of nowhere Pennsylvania after being reunited with her long-lost grandfather. I’m Ben Solo,” he says, still eyeing up the instrument room in hopes of catching his friend.  
  
At least Rey thinks this Hux fellow is his friend, but she’s learned you can never be too sure about these things in an American high school.  
  
The introduction is cut short by the entrance of their band director, Dr. Luke Skywalker, and suddenly the whole of the concert band class rushes to find their seats as their teacher walks to the white board and starts writing a list of what Rey assumes is the songs they are going to spend the quarter learning. She makes no attempt to move, because she really was told to take the first chair when the class started, and Ben makes no move to sit in the empty second chair either. Instead, he just glares daggers at her while she tries her hardest not to physically cringe in her seat.  
  
Dr. Skywalker turns around after he finishes his writing and cocks his head to the side when he notices the silent standoff she and Ben are having.  
  
“Ben, take a seat,” their teacher says in his breezy way of speech Rey has become accustom to since she first spoke to the instructor in September about joining his band program.  
  
“Uncle, Dr. Skywalker... she’s in my chair. I’ve been first chair since I was a _sophomore_ ,” Ben says as he gestures towards her to the man who is apparently his uncle.  
  
Dr. Skywalker just sighs and rubs lightly at one temple before walking over to the two of them.  
  
“Ben, just take the second chair for now, and we’ll chat after class.”  
  
Ben’s jaw clenches tightly before he nods tightly and slinks down into the second chair, right next to the one that Rey currently occupies, and grumbles under his breath something she can barely make out while fixing her with the most intense glare she’s ever experienced.  
  
“You’re right, this does suck,” she murmurs back before turning her full attention back to her new teacher.  
  
***  
  
Here’s how it all happened.  
  
Rey had been initially excited at the prospect of playing with other students for once, having taught herself how to play a beat up old tenor sax she had found in one of the clunkers she cleaned out for her former foster father, Unkar Plutt, while still in London. It seemed like ages ago, using her precious spare time when she wasn’t earning her keep looking up videos on YouTube and slowly figuring out the proper technique for an instrument that seemed far too big for her small frame, but in reality, it had only been a year ago.  
  
She blamed it all on the whirlwind of her life these past few months, the chance encounter upon her grandfather as she dropped off a small bundle of flowers at her mother’s gravesite on the anniversary of her death that lead to discovering that her Grandpa Ben wasn’t even aware of her existence. His only daughter lost all contact with her parents after falling into a lifestyle of heavy drug use, the thing that eventually killed her, and they had no idea that their daughter had even given birth, he later explained after the DNA test came back proving their relation. It had taken some time, but Grandpa Ben was able to get all the paperwork in order to bring Rey back home with him to where he now lived in the states, a few short weeks into the new school year.  
  
She was quite upset when she learned she missed the start of marching season, but Dr. Skywalker had given her free use of a practice room, so she could spend some time playing and gathering her bearings on sight reading music before the start of concert band.  
  
“Entirely self-taught, you say?” the older instructor questioned her one afternoon as she ran through every piece of increasingly difficult sheet music with ease.  
  
“Uh… yeah, I mean I’ve never had a formal lesson. Just lots of time on YouTube and as many books as I could manage to find. Why, am I that bad?” she had asked with a sense of panic.  
  
“Oh no, no no Miss Kenobi. You’re one of the most naturally talented musicians I have ever met, it’s amazing you’ve only been playing for a short year. I’d like you to sit first chair on the first day of concert band, if that’s fine with you,” Dr. Skywalker had told her with a sincerity that she never questioned and only agreed to enthusiastically, only vaguely thinking about who she might be displacing.  
  
If only she had realized the person in question was going to be the nephew of her teacher.  
  
***  
  
Concert band was only a nine-week course, and after the first week Rey resigns herself to spending the rest of the quarter receiving the near constant glares of her stand partner. Ben was an extremely talented musician, clearly, he had spent many years perfecting his craft, so it’s not as if Rey didn’t understand why he was upset to lose first chair during his senior year of high school, even if it was ridiculously childish.  
  
They bicker, probably a little more than what is necessary given that they only see each other during their second block class. Okay, and sometimes in the hallway. And occasionally outside of school, but that’s only because his parents know her grandfather.  
  
Ben treats her like a thorn in his side.  
  
Rey refers to him as her nemesis while talking to her friends.  
  
By week number five, she’s over the antics. Obviously the world has thrown them together, at least for the rest of the school year, so she’s bound and determined to make Ben Solo her friend.  
  
He doesn’t appear to have that many people close to him; the redheaded kid, Hux, seems to antagonize him nearly as often as they are seen laughing together, and Gwen Phasma, the tall leggy blonde who easily traverses between the jocks and band geeks, seem to be his only real friends, if you could even call them that.  
  
“Uh Ben?” she asks cautiously one day after class as they are putting their instruments away.  
  
The senior rolls his eyes as he places his case near the top of the selves before wordlessly taking hers and setting it up next to his. It’s a kind and unexpected gesture, and not even what she was going to ask, but he’s probably tired of watching her climb the selves to get her instrument up there and took a pity on her.  
  
“Thanks, but uh, that’s not what I was going to ask,” she says as she follows him out of the storage room and into a nearly empty classroom where just a few stragglers are grabbing their things before they go.  
  
“What do you want Kenobi?” he asks in a bored tone as he hefts his bookbag across his back before turning back to her.  
  
“Dr. Skywalker gave me the audition music for Junior District band and I was hoping you’d be willing to run it over with me? I mean, I understand you have your own audition to work on, but I’ve never really done anything like this and I’d rather have a peer critique me than Skywalker, you know?”  
  
“Did you say Junior District?” Ben asks her with his head cocked to the side, that being the only piece of information he has seemed to grasp.  
  
“Uh yeah. He gave me the option between Junior and Senior since I’m a freshman, and I figured both our best chances would be for us to audition for separate ones,” she tells honestly, because that’s really what she thought at the time.  
  
She really wanted to be picked for the performance, but the chances of them taking two tenor saxes from the same school seemed small, so she went with the Junior band since this was Ben’s last chance to make it all the way to the State level. Dr. Skywalker insisted that it was possible, but Rey had never actually had to audition for anything before and her nerves may have played a minor role in her decision making process.  
  
“What, you think you would best me? I’ll give it to you freshman, you’re talented, but you lack musicality that comes with years of practicing and you don’t have quite the same amount of performance stamina as most kids your age yet.”  
  
“Well gee, thanks. You could have just said no,” she tells him in a stunned tone as she strides to the classroom door.  
  
“I didn’t say no. I’ll help you. You’re good even if your technique is lacking,” he babbles as he races to catch up to her.  
  
Rey turns around to reply and is a little stunned to see how close Ben stands to her, she takes  a full step back and still has to raise her chin to look him in the eye.  
  
“What’s the catch?” she asks, single eyebrow raised in question.  
  
Ben just shakes his head at her as his lips purse together and he clenches his jaw. She can tell he’s mulling something over in that head of his just by the way he runs a single hand through his painstakingly straightened hair.  
  
“Let me sit first chair in spring Jazz Ensemble. I assume you’re going to take that class too?” he asks, almost pleadingly in his tone.  
  
Rey just nods wordlessly, as she’s suddenly found herself a little mesmerized by the constellation of moles on Ben’s face and wow, have his eyes always looked like a pool of molten chocolate?  
  
It’s a startling revelation.  
  
The word _handsome_ flashes across her mind and it alarms her how unexpected and weirdly right that word seems when she thinks about this boy who has done nothing but be rude and glare daggers at her since they met.  
  
“You see, Jazz Ensemble plays graduation this year. I’m a senior, and I’m sure you’ve noticed my lack of friends, so I’d rather not have one more night of teasing over band, the thing I’m supposed to be the best at, on my last night in this hell hole,” he explains as she continues to nod in agreement, though she stopped listening after the word graduation.  
  
Getting hung up on a senior was definitely not something she should be doing.   
  
Especially when that senior in question seems to tolerate her at best.  
  
“Yeah. I get it,” she says as she looks up at him through her lashes with the beginnings of a smile on her face.  
  
“Uh. So. Tomorrow?” Ben asks. The tips of his previously hidden ears have started to turn red and if Rey didn’t know any better, she would think Ben is nervous.  
  
“Yeah, tomorrow,” she offers as she turns to head off to her next class. She leaves Ben standing there with a dumbfounded look and it makes her heart race just a little bit as she can’t help but grin to herself.  
  
Whatever this is, her sudden and surprising interest in Ben Solo is probably all from the fact that he’s standing so close still and he’s talking to her so earnestly, and she thinks he’s finally making an effort to be nice for once.

 

Yeah, that’s totally what this is.

 

Rey Kenobi most certainly is not starting to crush on the biggest jerk she knows.

**Author's Note:**

> The setting is fall of 2008 because that's when I was a high school senior and also I badly needed to write Ben Solo with painstakingly straightened hair. 
> 
> I'm over on tumblr at @forcebondbensolo OR at my main @bex-xo, and you can occasionally find me on Twitter at @bexbex_xo
> 
> Let me know what you think? :)


End file.
